Mr. Kalpesh A. Patel is a member of the Senior Executive Service (SES). Mr. Patel currently serves as the Executive Director for Technology and Capability Readiness within the Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction Office (CWMD), responsible for collaborating with other DHS components, industry stakeholders, national laboratories, academia, and the interagency to understand the current state and readiness level of technologies and capabilities related to CWMD’s and its supported operational partners’ missions and understand how these align to potentially close gaps in capabilities.

Prior to serving in his current role, Mr. Patel served as an acting Associate Deputy Assistant Secretary (ADAS) of System Support Directorate (SSD) within the CWMD, where he was responsible for overseeing day to day operation of SSD which consist of R&D, T&E, Acquisition, Rapid Capability, and Program Integration and Support Divisions. Mr. Patel also served as the Director of Acquisition within CWMD where he was responsible for the development and acquisition of Chemical, Biological, Radiation and Nuclear (CBRN) detection solutions required to support the DHS mission of detecting and identifying dangerous CBRN threats and Radiological and Nuclear (R/N) sources outside of regulatory control. Mr. Patel also served as the Assistant Director at Domestic Nuclear Detection Office where he was responsible for acquisition and deployment of R/N detection capabilities to support the DHS operational components. He also served as Deputy Director of the Health Threat Resilience Division and the Component Acquisition Executive within the Department of Homeland Security, Office of Health Affairs. Mr. Patel was responsible for the design, initiation, and coordination of major national programs focused on bio-detection, biosurveillance, and chemical defense. He oversaw the BioWatch, National Biosurveillance Integration Center and was responsible for strategy, policy, and management of all aspects of biological and chemical detection and integration of DHS detection systems with those of other Federal agencies.

Mr. Patel started his career in the government at the State of Illinois in 1995, after graduating from the University of Illinois with Master of Science in Environmental Engineering. At the Illinois EPA, Mr. Patel was involved in the State permitting and rule making process for promulgation of the Illinois EPA's risk based regulations and foundry sand regulations.

In the private sector, Mr. Patel served as a Senior Program Manager, managing multi-million dollar Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) Corrective Action projects. In 2005, Mr. Patel transitioned back into federal government service as an engineer and remediation program manager, within the Department of Defense. He subsequently joined the U. S. Secret Service as an engineer and later promoted to the Branch Chief position where he led the development and deployment of innovative countermeasures to safeguard the White House and other protected areas from chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear materials, and explosive devices (CBRNE).

In addition to his Master’s degree, he holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering. Mr. Patel is license Professional Engineer, and is registered in the State of Illinois and Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. He currently resides in Brunswick, MD with his wife and three children.
DHS